The present invention generally relates to the field of semiconductor production, and more particularly to a wafer storage and management system and methods for managing wafers.
Semiconductor wafers or other such substrates are typically subjected to many processing steps that involve moving said wafers from one type of processing tool to another. For example, wafers that have been subjected to one process in a wafer deposition chamber may have to be moved for cleaning and drying to another processing tool, and then they may have to be transferred to a different processing tool for additional processing steps. In many cases the wafers have to be stored between different processing steps. In accordance with the prior art the pods for transferring the wafers from one processing tool to another are also used for this storage. Therefore, a large number of such pods are required in semiconductor production fabs in accordance with the prior art.
A further problem related with the prior art is that, for transporting wafers between different bays, inter-bay pods have to be used. However, due to these inter-bay pods there is a serious risk of cross-contaminations between these different bays.
The present invention seeks to provide a wafer management system and methods for managing wafers that reduce the storage space required for wafers, reduce the number of necessary pods, reduce the risk of cross-contaminations between different bays and allow greater control of wafer management.